Numerous injuries and deaths occur each year when people and animals unintentionally contact an operating boat motor propeller. Due to its position on a motorized boat and the fact that a boat motor propeller spins at a very high RPM during use, it often poses a significant safety risk to any person or animal in proximity to the propeller. For example, spinning boat motor propellers have caused serious injuries to boat passengers, water skiers, swimmers, scuba divers, and aquatic wildlife, such as manatees. Manatees are particularly susceptible since they spend a large portion of the day swimming in shallow waters.
Even though there are several boat motor propeller guards, cages, and/or shields designed to reduce the number of accidents and injuries caused by rotating propellers, they often don't address other serious safety problems to people, the aquatic wildlife, and to the propellers, themselves. Some boat motor propeller guards increase the frequency of blunt force trauma to people and aquatic wildlife due to their larger size and specific shape. Despite limiting the harm caused by propeller blade lacerations, many conventional propeller guards often cause blunt force trauma to people and aquatic wildlife swimming below the guards due to the keel or skeg projecting below the propeller.
In other instances, some conventional propeller guards merely comprise ring-like structures that do not fully encapsulate the propellers from all sides. As a result, rocks, weeds, fishing lines, and other debris may become entangled within the propeller, which cause damage to the propeller and impede the function of the boat. Even if no damage is caused to the propeller, the entanglement is likely to cause drag that will slow the boat and limit its range of operation. Propeller guards that have attempted to solve this problem require the use of bulky, permanent structures and additions that may not be easily removed or modified in a boat.
Accordingly, there is a need for an apparatus that protects people, animals, aquatic and plant wildlife from inadvertently contacting a moving boat propeller, while simultaneously preventing blunt force trauma related impacts caused by a moving boat. Beneficially, such an apparatus would be easily attached to and removed from conventional boat motors.